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That's pretty much the way kids think though, isn't it? Not all kids, but it's a human-nature thing to want to be able to say "my team is better than your team."

Only sort of related: I have a friend who got into sports in the early 2000s, when he was about 7/8 years old. His favorite sports teams are the Yankees, Buccaneers, and University of Miami football. He started getting interested in hockey a few years ago; he's a Penguins fan.

To his credit he's still a Buccaneers and Miami fan today. 2002 seems like more than 11 years ago to Buccaneers fans. But let's give it another ten years and see how strong the loyalty is.

I became a baseball fan by randomly watching the 1986 playoffs as a kid, which was a pretty incredible way to start given it was three of the greatest postseason series of all time. I thought Man, is it always like this? I was rooting for the Mets since my best friend across the street was from New York so it even had a happy ending. Then in 1987 I discovered Oakland had a team, McGwire went on the home run chase, and that was that.

astros 1984 - 2012. my mama took me to the ballpark and i immediately knew that what i wanted to do was to play baseball. hopefully with kevin bass. i cried when
1 - he got traded to the giants
2 - i realized that i wouldn't never make the majors. or play baseball ANYWHERE outside the backyard

sort of braves fan starting in 1980 something because they were on all the time on TBS - had left by 91 because i was rooting for barry lamar bonds and the pirates. when i wasn't rooting for the astros, i mean.

sort of st louis fan 2011 - 2012 because that's where lance berkman played and also because mama said so

sort of pirates fan mid 2012 - now every 5th game because wandy pitches there

mostly braves fan now because of chris johnson and evan gattis

i root for ANY NL team against ANY AL team especially if they are playing a game using the (swear words) FP (fake player)

I can claim no superiority of character. I became a Braves fan in 1991.

Became a Braves fan in the mid-80s because they were always on TV and Skip and Pete were great to listen to. Those teams were God-awful of course. Growing up in Michigan (I discerned the evils of the DH from a young age, the Tigers were out) I was the only Braves fan I knew.

When they suddenly got good in '91, I actually had people come up to me regularly and say 'Congratulations on the Braves' or something similar. I have to say, felt pretty good.

Yanks, 1950, when I was six. My NYC block was largely Italian, as were the Yanks' four best players that year. It wasn't very complicated.

i root for ANY NL team against ANY AL team

Exactly the opposite with me, with two historic exceptions for the 1954 and 1959 World Series, when bogus Indians and White Sox teams were pretending to represent the AL against the Giants and the Dodgers; and also when the Nats are playing any AL team other than the Yanks or the Orioles. That last matchup is the closest to 50-50 I've ever been in my life, but the tie has to go to the AL rep.

Giants 1962 -- age 3 months. Put in front of the TV for the playoffs and World Series.

We had moved to the Seattle area, so the Mariners became my AL team when they were created in 1977.

When I moved to DC I adopted the Orioles as long as they weren't playing the M's -- thus the 1997 ALDS was bittersweet. When the Nationals arrived they became my primary NL team. I will root for the Nats over the Giants unless the game is more important to the Giants.

I would guess that the vast majority of people who became fans as kids, and who were not indoctrinated by adults, choose winning teams. Winning causes cultural resonance, you often won't even hear about a losing team if you're not already a sports fan.

Except for dread football, which is like the cultural background radiation of the US.

Marlins 1997 - because I know a good thing when I see it - largely from lazing in front of the TV on Sunday mornings in my dorm's kitchen.

Nah, who am I fooling, I once got this great spreadsheet with stats, and then I got Moneyball and was hooked, I only watch games in Excel and get my thrills from calculating the dollar-efficiency leader.

Giants when we moved to California and Twins from living in MN. Cubs and White Sox flings from when I lvied there. (Years are all over the place, we moved a bunch). basically I adopted the teams of where I was living (and kept them for the most part). Oakland has sports teams I guess and I could have adopted them, but I have disliked that town and its fans from early on, so SF teams were my only real North California choice.

I have a hard time (easier now in the age of the internet) being a fan of an out of town team. So I picked up the local teams. Maybe I am shallow that way though.

EDIT: Except the Bears in Chicago and any Florida teams (lived there too). Always hated the Bears and (almost) anything Florida related.

Like Kurt I started rooting for the Yankees in 76. I became a baseball nut that spring. My teacher that year played on the Canadian National Baseball team and was in the Pan Am Games in 1975. Also watching the 1975 World Series put me from baseball fan to fanatic. Up to then, my policy was to cheer for whoever was in the defending champs. Realizing the soulless aspect of this I latched onto:

Yankees - based upon reading a Mickey Mantle bio that year and the History of the World Series. I was born in 1964 which seemed fate says I should cheer for the Yanks. I became such a fan my parents designed the summer vacation around going to the Twin Cities to see them that August. First time I ever saw them. I hadn't even seen the Yankees on tv.

Islanders - hated Canadian teams and the Jets were WHA so after the Isles epic comeback against Pittsburgh and almost repeated against the Flyers (who everyone loved) I was on board. Classic example of imprinting.

Vikings - the only NFL team we would get on tv late in the year. (The NFL was never shown until after the CFL Grey Cup was concluded.) And the Vikes had Tark and Chuck Foreman. They were exciting and always getting close to the Super Bowl.

My brother is such a psycho Flyers fan he has brainwashed his 4 year old. It is so bad that his kid recently walked up to a big stranger in a Wal-Mart and told the guy that his Penguins shirt stinks while giving him the thumbs down.

SC: are you really a Marlins fan? I didn't think there were any anymore.

Fixed that for you.

Was a Vikings and SF Giants fan growing up in Seattle until 76/77 when we actually got teams. How could you not like Tarkenton and the People Eaters? Still have a soft spot for the childhood faves, but have mostly suffered crushing blow after crushing blow for 35 years. 1995 was nice, as was the Super Bowl run. Apart from those, yeesh.

Been a Yankees fan since early 70s, the fandom was probably more Metsish in my NJ neighborhood at the time since they'd won the WS in 69 and went again in 73, and I was probably just reacting against those kids rather than for the Yankees initially. But I was lucky enough to see the last game in the House That Ruth Built; that mayhem made an impression on me, luckily my dad was not there to get 2nd base, a seat, or clod of dirt, etc. The Cardinals were my NL team because almost all of my family is from southern Illinois and I'd see a few of those games, but I'm done with them now, since I'm in DC and have Nats partial season tickets. Pete F'n Kozma.

Nobody would let you get away with that crap of rooting for both the Mets and Yankees back then. Who does this kid think he is, Billy Crystal?

My brother is such a psycho Flyers fan he has brainwashed his 4 year old. It is so bad that his kid recently walked up to a big stranger in a Wal-Mart and told the guy that his Penguins shirt stinks while giving him the thumbs down.

I know there are dozens of worse things to care about, but I really hate that sort of thing. I live in dread of being the kind of dad who teaches his kid to say, "Yankees suck!" Let him figure it out on his own, I say.

Reds growing up in the 60s, the closest team to my home south of Columbus. It wasn't like there was a choice, literally everyone I knew was a Reds fan except one weird kid who liked the Indians. Moved to St. Louis for school in '75, added the Cardinals. Moved to Austin in '78 and pretty much dropped the Reds and kept the Cards, since I could get KMOX at night and there was no internet (and rooting for a Texas team was out of the question, although I was kinda sorta fond of the mid-80s Astros). Was living in Utah when the Rockies came into being in '93 and added them, even more so after I moved to 45 min. from Coors Field in '98. When the Cards play the Rockies I just root against a sweep by either team.

The only excuse for rooting for the Yankees is being from New York. I have a friend who grew up in Minnesota and is a Yankees/Manchester United fan. He obviously should have his children taken away, except he doesn't have any.

My baseballing formative years were in the one era that the Mets were the more popular team in town. Tons of kids were Mets fans in the 80s.

There's a pretty sharp cutoff on age. You have to be born in 1980 or earlier. I was 1978 and just old enough to be barely aware of 1986, and followed the 1988 team closely. My brother was born 1981 and the near-dynasty is just legend to him without firsthand experience, no different than the 70s Yankees. This pattern holds through pretty much everyone I knew in high school and college -- there's very few Mets fans more than 2-3 years younger than me born after 1980. I get the sense that holds on BTF too, the Mets fans are all at least mid-thirties now, there's hardly any Mets fans younger than would have firsthand memories of 1986-1988.

I'm Mets/Giants/Islanders, which everybody finds weird, they think it should be Jets instead as all the "alternative" teams plus the Shea connection. For me, it's the teams that were good in my formative 80s.

As a kid, I would favor the A's and Reds (duh)...and when I stopped playing little league, I stopped having a fave. Then I became a Red Sox fan in 1986. (The whole, 'awww this team needs my support' thing)

edit: Oh are we doing other sports too?

Raiders when I saw them play the Imperial March in 1981. Stopped when they started falling for their own bullshit.

Newcastle cause I liked the unis. Stopped when they fired Sir Bobby.

Vancouver Canucks until they traded Pavel Bure, changed unis and their logo.

Phoenix Suns cause they had no other pro team then. Stopped cause I lost interest in basketball.

Only sort of related: I have a friend who got into sports in the early 2000s, when he was about 7/8 years old. His favorite sports teams are the Yankees, Buccaneers, and University of Miami football. He started getting interested in hockey a few years ago; he's a Penguins fan.

Growing up in the late 80s/early 90s:

My brother was an Oakland A's fan, and a Dallas Cowboys fan
I was a Chicago Cubs/Houston Astros fan, a Hartford Whalers, and a Denver Broncos/Indianapolis Colts fan

He's stuck with the Cowboys all this time, whereas I ditched the Broncos and Colts as soon as they won a Super Bowl. Oddly enough I really like the A's now, and he doesn't.

My brother is such a psycho Flyers fan he has brainwashed his 4 year old. It is so bad that his kid recently walked up to a big stranger in a Wal-Mart and told the guy that his Penguins shirt stinks while giving him the thumbs down.

I went to university with a Flyers fan in Saskatchewan. I'm amazed that kind of thing is legal in Canada.

Like my brother, my dad was a Flyers fan. (Bobby Clarke was god). And me being the Islanders fan....well Bobby Nystrom was a very nice moment in my home on that Saturday afternoon in 1980.

It continues on....my daughter loves the Flyers (my brother encouraged her....). My 10 year old has followed my footsteps and is a big fan of John Taveres and Travis Hamonic (who is from nearby St. Malo, MB). The rivalry will continue for another generation in a household. Things are trending in the right direction for my son.

My son is also a Yankee fan. His favorite was Jorge Posoda (his favorite position is catcher). In 2010, I took him to Minny for a Yankees Twins series. He didn't know who Joe Mauer was but with all the promo and seeing him play he said that Joe Mauer was one of his favorites. It was interesting to see how the promotion of a star player and the reaction of the hometown towards him influenced a youngster.

Yankee fan from the late Stengel era. Back then there was only limited TV exposure in upstate NY, but a pretty extensive radio network. Only a vague memory of the Yankees coming back from a 3-1 deficit to win the 1958 World Series, but still a bit haunted by clear memories of the 1960 WS loss. Never wavered during the awful CBS era or mid-Steinbrenner collapse. Less of a fan of other sports, and didn't have strong attachments except to NFL Giants. Started law school in DC just after the expansion Senators were hijacked to Texas. Stayed in the area and gradually switched allegiance to Redskins, Capitals & Bullets/Wizards. Always felt it was a gross injustice that Washington didn't have a MLB team, so was pleased to see the Nationals arrive and wish them well, but my allegiance is on a lesser level. I guess I'm something of a die-hard, but the emergence of Extra Innings and MLB.TV have been great for expatriate fans, and I suspect we'll see more casual fans with out-of-area rooting interests as access to out-of-market games continues to improve.

Red Sox...pretty much from birth. Grandfather was a Sox fan, dad was a Sox fan...not much choice really. All the old stories of Williams, Bob Doerr etc, it became ingrained. The only non-Sox player both my dad and granddad spoke fondly of was Mickey Mantle. They said he was just the most amazing player to watch.

Rangers, 1989. I turned 30 years old that spring, and had followed the home team wherever I'd moved in the past, and had just moved here in the fall of '88. Didn't expect to stay, certainly didn't expect to like the Rangers, who by 1989 (and for a while thereafter) were known for "never playing a meaningful game in September." But they've grown on me :)

My baseballing formative years were in the one era that the Mets were the more popular team in town. Tons of kids were Mets fans in the 80s.

There's a pretty sharp cutoff on age. You have to be born in 1980 or earlier. I was 1978 and just old enough to be barely aware of 1986, and followed the 1988 team closely.

Interestingly, we have a cutoff like that in the Bay Area too. I'm an A's fan but also a rabid 49ers fan who dislikes the Raiders because when I was a kid the 49ers were in the Bay and the Raiders were in Los Angeles. It's kids who were born in the late 70s - mid 80s who have this rooting blip, then it resumes being A's-Raiders and Giants-49ers. Every once in a while it registers with me that the Raiders are an Oakland team and I should at least not find pleasure in their foibles, but it doesn't click.

I was, as many here, born into Red Sox fandom. My great-grandparents left Belarus in 1917 and my grandfather was born in Connecticut in 1919. I'm told baseball was the only American radio my great-grandfather ever listened to. So I'm fourth-generation.

Never really had an NFL team though I liked the Dolphins a bit as a kid (also from my dad; growing up in CT I guess the Pats stunk and he hated them, but at night he could pick up a Miami radio station and he liked Shula. Between that and my abiding affection for Dan Marino (as a player) I went with it for a while) but gave them up a year or two after Marino retired and I realized that I just didn't care. Lived in the Bay all my life so I've always followed the local squads, and became a real fan of the Niners when they hired Nolan and he drafted Smith. I think I was lucky to experience enough of the thin years to disqualify myself as a frontrunner for becoming a fan of them late in life since they are now good.

Funny anecdote about how this stuff works. My best friend, also born and raised in the Bay, is a die-hard Cowboys fan. This is because he grew up in the 80's and his brother (a year older) was already a Niners fan. What else was he to do?

I feel kind of weird about people who live in regions with a nearby pro-team who are fans of another team they don't have any connection with. If you lived in a city for a long time, or grew up there, or have close family that support the team, or live/grow up way the hell away from any team in the league, those are all completely halal. But if you just bandwagon onto a team because they're good, especially if you're not under the age of 12? More haram and less kosher than eating pork.

I'm a Mets pretty much from birth, my mom was and remains a gigantic Mets fan, my dad is only a moderate baseball fan but also grew up a Mets fan. I remember them taping the 86 playoffs when I was 4 and a half years old so I could watch them the next day. In 1988 my dad caused the Mets to lose game 4 of the NLCS by demanding that he get his "full nine innings" after the bottom of the 8th. I was told this the next morning by my Mom, since I wasn't allowed to stay up to watch more than the first couple innings. This would be slightly less horrible if my dad hadn't previously done the exact same thing during a game we attended at Shea, and where he wanted to get the full value of the tickets he had purchased. He said it loudly enough that it annoyed the fans around us, and after the Mets promptly blew the game a lady was telling everyone to blame him while I inconsolably cried "Why did daddy do that?!"

The Red Sox slowly crept into my life after my family moved to Massachusetts in 1988, to the point where I was a fan by the mid-1990s and pretty dedicated from 1998 onwards. I feel I only became a true fan in 2003 after the Grady Little affair, though.

I was born in Buffalo, so I loved the Bills, and the first Superbowl I remember watching was the Scott Norwood game. Scott, of course, is my name. I feel it makes sense that I drifted into being a Sox fan prior to 2004 given some of my most formative fandom experiences were 4 straight superbowl loses. Like the Sox, I became a fan of the Patriots in the mid-90s, my early teenage years.

eta: It's also OK to be a fan of an expansion team that start's in the region where you live when they start. This is a subsection of the first part of my Fandom Kashrut, where you can shift allegiance to a team from the area you're living over time.

Funny anecdote about how this stuff works. My best friend, also born and raised in the Bay, is a die-hard Cowboys fan. This is because he grew up in the 80's and his brother (a year older) was already a Niners fan. What else was he to do?

I can see that: my older brother has never been to Pittsburgh, but he started liking the Steelers when they were winning Super Bowls in the mid-70's, and he's stuck with them through all six of the losing seasons they've had over the last 40 years.
Me, I was already an Astros fan (geography + Astrodome awesomeness + Jose Cruuuuz + Nolan Ryan), so to the extent I ever cared about football, I was an Oilers fan (geography + Astrodome awesomeness + Earl Campbell + White Shoes Johnson + Bum Phillips).

... thereby commencing a lifelong relationship with fun teams that never quiiiiiite win at the end: I didn't pay attention to baseball hardly at all between when the Astros lost the 1986 NLCS... and early 2000, when I happened to hear Bill King broadcasting A's games on KABL and it quickly became a habit. I don't know if the habit would have stuck, if the A's had been lousy then. Still, 2007-2011 were some pretty pleh years, and I had a lot of fun watching them anyway. So maybe I'm NOT a front-runner. I dunno.

Brewers since cognitive years (late 70s/early 80s), good timing, but then followed by fans of certain players (Ozzie, Yount, Reggie, Nolan, Bo Jackson, Vince Coleman, Tim Raines, Rickey) more than teams, I've always liked baseball more than I like the Brewers. There's more fun in rooting against clubs and players (especially in golf) than in rooting for teams and players. I hated Brett, the White Sox, Rose, Kent Hrbek and Dan Gladden. Now (at least from that era) I just hate Rose, Jack Morris and Jim Rice. heh.

Of course could be a result of Brewers being out of it much more often than not. I've moved a little bit, but can't imagine 'adopting' another set of teams.

I never cared one way or another for the Packers (nobody in our house really did), though endorse Lambeau Field experience. We watch football on Saturday (Nebraska).

Mets fan growing up, unfortunately became cognizant enough to follow the team in 88. Fandom started to fade with the Piazza trade when I had always hated the Yankees for buying players and now the Mets were (essentially) doing it too. started to get hooked on the A's in 99 and moved out to the Bay Area (mostly coincidentally) in the summer of 2000, going on 13 years of various forms of heartbreak (not sure which is worst, all the round 1 game 5 losses, all the injuries, or the stupid stadium / Wolff nonsense that has dragged on for so long).

I've never understood families with split loyalties when it comes to teams. Everyone in my family roots for all SF Bay Area teams except the Raiders who we are indifferent to because of the move to LA. We all root for Cal and Stanford, too, despite that being kind of insane. If St. Mary's or is in the NCAA tourney or San Jose St. is playing North Texas in a bowl game, we'll root for them too despite caring not at all what they're up to the rest of the year.

Red Sox...pretty much from birth. Grandfather was a Sox fan, dad was a Sox fan...not much choice really.

Same here, except Mom was a bigger Sox fan than Dad. My grandfather was around 15 years old in 1915; Mom was 15 in 1946; I was 16 in 1986. Thus each of us in our mid-teens got to see a pennant-winner, which simply reinforced our fandom. My first game was in 1976, but AFAICR I had no real concept that the Red Sox were defending AL champions at the time.

I took the "home team" path to rooting interests through my formative years, going for the Celtics, Bruins, and Patriots, although for football because the Patriots were so consistently bad when I was younger I ended up with an alternate team.

Usually for any sporting event in which I don't have a predetermined rooting interest, I'll pick one of the sides and root for them. The first year I actually paid attention to the Super Bowl it was 49ers and Bengals, and before the game I decided to root for the 49ers. I can't recall why I did, but I did. I continue to root for them today. They are my only remaining out-of-town-of-origin team.

When I was 9 or 10, because I liked baseball so much I decided I needed an alternate there, too. It needed to be an NL team, since I already had an AL team. (The logic of a 10 year old. Sigh.) And I chose the Expos. (Sigh...) In all honesty I didn't root for them very much, but I always had an affinity for them.

I've never understood families with split loyalties when it comes to teams

My father, a native Northsider, was a profound Cubs fan, and a mild Bears fan. My mother (who was no more from Wisconsin than he was, and disliked baseball) would nominally root for the Milwaukee Braves, and was a fanatical Packers fan. It makes perfect sense to me now :)

My father, a native Northsider, was a profound Cubs fan, and a mild Bears fan. My mother (who was no more from Wisconsin than he was, and disliked baseball) would nominally root for the Milwaukee Braves, and was a fanatical Packers fan. It makes perfect sense to me now :)

Ah. I come from a single parent home which may explain my family's rooting situation.

Cubs, 1982. I grew up midway between Chicago and Detroit in Tiger fan country, but I chose the Cubs because (1) I'm a contrarian; there's no doubt in my mind that if I'd grown up on the north side of Chicago, where I now reside, I'd be a fan of some other team, and (2) this was pre-lights at Wrigley Field at a time when WGN carried about 150 games a year, so they were always on TV when I came home from school. I actually tried to be a Tiger fan in '81, when I first started following baseball (the split-season playoff format and standings were very confusing to me), but got frustrated when they lost 10 games in a row or something. Oddly, the Cubs' 13-game losing streak very early in my fandom didn't drive me away...

i root for ANY NL team against ANY AL team especially if they are playing a game using the (swear words) FP (fake player)

Speaking of that, and the Cubs, how 'BOUT that Travis Wood, huh bbc? Say what you will about the Cubs, but their pitchers have 4 home runs this year. Wood has a 141 OPS+.

That's pretty much the way kids think though, isn't it? Not all kids, but it's a human-nature thing to want to be able to say "my team is better than your team."

Probably so, but I was always rooting for the underdog, which made being a Vikings and SF Giants then NY Mets fan while growing up consistent, at least.

Was a Vikings and SF Giants fan growing up in Seattle until 76/77 when we actually got teams. How could you not like Tarkenton and the People Eaters? Still have a soft spot for the childhood faves, but have mostly suffered crushing blow after crushing blow for 35 years. 1995 was nice, as was the Super Bowl run. Apart from those, yeesh.

Greetings, sir. We are a very rare breed indeed, especially not having grown up in either SF or MN.

I went to my first baseball game when I was 9 months old at Candlestick Park wearing a Red Sox t-shirt and hat. My parents are from Connecticut so I tend to root for SF or Boston teams. I also have a soft spot for the Mets, as three of my dad's siblings are Mets fans. Growing up in Connecticut in a big Irish family in the 60s, they drank a ton of milk and enough caps meant free admission to Shea, so they got to go a few times a year. Plus they were all young enough to fall in love with the Mets in 1969, as the whole tri-state area experienced serious Mets mania. But my grandfather was from Rhode Island and took my dad to a few games in 1967 while he visited his brother at Boston College, so he was an Impossible Dream Red Sox fan rather than a Miracle Mets fan.

Celtics from dad. I'm juuuust old enough to remember Bird. Apparently my parents took me to a Celtics-Warriors game when I was a kid so I can say I saw Bird play, but I don't remember it. Other than Chris Mullin I have never cared about the Warriors.

The Patriots were a joke when I was a little kid while the 49ers were the class of the league. My dad's more of a 49ers fan anyway so it wasn't difficult.

My dad's also a Montreal Canadiens fan, because growing up in the 60s there were only six teams and the Bruins and Rangers were mediocre while the Canadiens were incredible (Detroit, Toronto and Chicago were too far west for genuine consideration). The Habs won their last Cup when I was 7, which I remember pretty well, and I was a huge Roy fan. I was also really into the Sharks at that time being a big Arturs Irbe fan, plus the teal was everywhere in the Bay Area. I remember the Sharks being much more popular in San Francisco/outside the South Bay than they are now. As the 1994 Cinderella team broke apart I lost interest, and the only thing that keeps me from being totally agnostic about them is Randy Hahn, who is a great play by play announcer who's been with the team since the start.

Speaking of that, and the Cubs, how 'BOUT that Travis Wood, huh bbc? Say what you will about the Cubs, but their pitchers have 4 home runs this year. Wood has a 141 OPS+.

- AWESOME!!!!

the DH sucks. i always rooted for the micah ownings/carlos zambrano pitchers when they weren't facing my team. cubs pitchers had more homers in may than the entire royals team. and some DHs.

it's tough to find good hitting pitchers because if a guy can hit, unless he pitches like an ace, they take him off the mound. and also, good hitting pitchers are told to bunt with runners on base, so they don't get real chances.

one of my favorite games is still one of roger clemens' back in 04 in which he pitched shutout ball and drove in the game's only 2 runs. roger eff clemens. who lived in the DH league for 15+ years. it was kewl.

Grew up in upstate NY, became a Cubs fan in the late 50s because of Ernie Banks. A shortstop who leads the league in homers! How cool is that? When the Mets were created, they became my 2nd team, which made 1962 a particularly "character-building" experience. Moved to Brooklyn in 1980, found it increasingly difficult to root against the Mets when they were playing the Cubs. And when Chicago blew the series against San Diego in '84, that was it for me. Though I still love Wrigley.

The only other sport I care about at all is tennis, because I play it. Enjoy watching, though I rarely do, and don't really follow individual players.

Baseball is just so much better than just about everything else humans have created to pass the time with.